realityman, your statement related to Farah shows how little you know about the political lay of the land in CA. While Pelosi suits her District well in the Bay Area, the same is hardly true of Sacramento, which though the actual city is somewhat liberal, the county and
surrounding areas of the Central Valley are hardly so.  Anyone who chooses to use Farah and his World Net Daily as a reliable source might begin by a researching more valid information provided by Source Watch such as this.  "Conservative" is hardly a correct description of Farah's work. We who have lived in the Sacramento area who remember the "Union" still resent what Farah did to that once conservative, but valid newspaper, which left the capital of the state with only a single major daily:" The Sacramento Bee."


Joseph Farah
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Joseph Farah is the founder, editor and CEO of WorldNetDaily (WND).

Farah made a name for himself with traditional daily newspapers prior to his founding of WorldNetDaily – running the Sacramento Union, directing the news operation of the Los Angeles Herald Examiner for six years and serving as editor in chief of a group of California dailies and weeklies.[1] While at the Sacramento Union (a newspaper owned prior to Farah's tenure by Richard Mellon Scaife), Farah took the paper in an even more conservative direction than it had been under Scaife and skewing stories to reflect conservative ideas. Farah resigned as editor 15 months later; under his editorship, the paper's circulation declined nearly 30 percent, from 72,000 to 52,000. [2] (The paper closed in 1994 but was revived in 2004.)

After leaving the Union, Farah and James H. Smith, the former publisher of the Union, co-founded the Western Journalism Center (WJC). In 1997 the WJC started WorldNetDaily, and in 1999 WND was spun off as a for-profit subsidiary. The greater part of WND is owned by Farah.[3]

Farah writes a daily column for WND and a weekly column syndicated by Creators Syndicate. He has written for publications such as the Jerusalem Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Sun-Times, and the Wall Street Journal.[4]

Farah is a member of the Council for National Policy.[5]

The website of the Ariel Center for Policy Research lists Farah as a "Contributing Expert." In June 2001, Farah authored a policy paper for the Center titled "How Islam Plays the Press". The paper was published in the Center's journal Nativ, and later as part of the book Muhammad's Monsters. Farah is himself an Arab-American.[6]"

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Joseph_Farah

But moving past the discussion related to your choice of source, I think you might find that some, who may at times participate in this
forum, actually make an attempt to look at more than a single aspect of the circumstances in the Middle East in general and for the purpose of this post, Israel in specific.  The unfortunate reality is those who have commented on this thread remain, even though none
appear to have much personal experience with Israel, with one possible exception,  so obviously biased  on thread after thread, there is
little point in attempting to post any factor not in total agreement.

You make it more than clear that there is no attempt at peace that would satisfy your blood lust for continuing warfare regardless of location so long there might be any possible relationship to Israel on any level. This statement alone says it all for you. Tends to make
one wonder, why such hatred for any and all who might prefer to observe more than one opinion on an issue. "There's a saying that goes something like... "You can't have lasting peace, until one side is beaten beyond it's ability to wage war".. realityman

LOL, realityman, you post your regular bloodlusting, warmongering posts, which are opinion only.  And you don't bother to read anything that doesn't suit your views as you also fail to note only those, with the exception of Terry Mathis, who even bother to post on this thread are those who are in agreement with you and your choice of opinion piece. 

A forum is a place IMO for sharing information and opinion.  I shared the opinion of Paul Woodward, editor of War In Contex.
You choose to share the opinion of a rabid right wing Zionist.  I chose to share the opinion I prefer which suggests there is no real support for the ceasefire from the U.S. on any level.   While you claim I show no basis for refuting the rant by Klein, you have no proof that his statements are anything more than opinion.  Woodward's related to the lack of support for the ceasefire from those who if they had any real desire for even attempting a solution to the continued warfare, between  those who are in your terms "terrorists" while the IDF and IAF or financed and armed by the U.S. taxpayer and continue to serve the purpose of the current U.S. Administration.  Woodward's comments, his opinion like Klein's are clearly hardly supportive of yours. Any proof his opinion is any more valid than Klein's?  You have none as it is all opinion and supposition.  In the end it is nothing more than conflicting opinions. 

Why not face reality, realityman.  No desire exists among the rabid, right wing Zionists in Israel nor in their supporters in the U.S. for
anything other than continued warfare. So long as they continue to be armed and used as a surrogate for U.S. power, not just in
Israel, but throughout the Middle East, you'll continue to get your wish. And if you can't get it by asymmetric warfare in one location then it will continue to be expanded to others as Terry Mathis suggested with an attack on Iran. 

Editor’s Comment —" Well, it’s safe to assume that we won’t be hearing any public appeals from Ehud Olmert, Tony Blair (he is still The Quartet’s star envoy, isn’t he?), George Bush, Condoleezza Rice, John McCain, or Barak Obama, calling on Mahmoud Abbas to reign in the Fatah militants. Neither will there be wider support for a ceasefire covering all the Palestinian occupied territories. I guess it’s because all the peace processors are such deep believers in true peace that they can only offer tepid support for a mere truce." Paul
Woodward.

BTW, can you prove Klein's opinion is anymore valid than Woodward's?  Are for that matter, yours and your choice of sources are anymore valid than mine?  Even your choice of topic line for this post expresses your personal bias which then continues to reflect the
opinion of those who are in agreement.

As to my choice to post here on your excessively biased opinion thread, that choice, though you may not like it or agree with it, remains
mine. There are other opinions that are quite as valid or perhaps more so than Farah's lackey Klein.

Ex-diplomat says US should engage with Hamas leaders

4 days ago

WASHINGTON (AFP) — A former senior US diplomat described senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniya as a "thoughtful politician," saying the US administration should drop its refusal to engage with the Palestinian movement.

Richard Viets, who was US ambassador to Jordan in the early 1980s, Tuesday recounted his meeting with Haniya in Gaza earlier this month as part of a private US group's fact-finding mission to the region.

"Haniya is a very smart, articulate, sophisticated, thoughtful politician. You have to be impressed sitting in the room with him," Viets told a news conference.

"On the whole his comments regarding Israel I thought were remarkably balanced and non-polemical," Viets said.

US media coverage had failed to convey an accurate picture of Hamas or Haniya's stance, which was more pragmatic than often portrayed, he said.

"He's a man we ought to know better. He's a man we ought to be talking with."

The United States and the European Union refuse talks with Hamas, which they consider a terrorist organization, unless it renounces violence and recognizes Israel's right to exist.

Viets was part of a team that met with officials and activists in Egypt, Lebanon, Israel, Gaza and the West Bank in a tour sponsored by the Council for the National Interest (CNI).

The full article can be accessed on the link.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gZGHLUwvm0gTFVZZmaUaf6_dl1ng
 

ROTFL, realityman, who isn't really into all that reality.  Is an opinion ever something that can be refuted?  When an op ed such as the one written by Klein ever be considered "false" by those who are in agreement with that opinion?  It is my opinion, based on my experience that Farah chooses to publish Klein and you choose to post his op ed because your personal opinion agrees with his.  Op eds are exactly that: opinion and nothing more or less.  Not the same as a fact.

Klein wrote an opinion piece, this article today from DEBKAfile is one where there is only reporting of the action that took place in the Knesset.  There is a difference you don't appear to recognize.  If as reported the exchange as takes place, then it will indeed be
a fact as the official count of the vote and naming those who voted for the exchange is also a fact, but those who voted against the deal
according to the article, without quotes from the actual members, chose to vote against the deal claimed with not factual quotes they did so because Israeli intelligence made a suggestion it would create more kidnappings.   

DEBKAfile - We start where the media stop

Israeli government approves prisoner swap with Hizballah

DEBKAfile Special Report

June 29, 2008, 4:54 PM (GMT+02:00)

Twenty-two ministers, including Prime Minister Ehud Olmert voted for the deal, over objections from three. The prime minister disclosed that the two Israeli soldiers whose handover was covered by the deal, Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, are believed to have died shortly after they were taken captive two years ago in a cross-border Hizballah raid. The three ministers who voted against the decision acted on the advice of heads of Israeli intelligence services who warned that it would open the door to more kidnaps of Israeli soldiers. Minutes after the decision was announced, Hizballah launched victory celebrations in Lebanon.

According to the deal, mediated by a German official, Israel has agreed to hand over the Nahariya murderer Samir Kuntar, after 24 years in jail, four Hizballah gunmen and bodies of fallen members, information about four Iranian diplomats who went missing 30 years ago in Lebanon and a group of Palestinians whose number will be determined by the Israeli government. Hizballah will hand over Regev and Goldwasser and information about the Israeli navigator Ron Arad who disappeared in Lebanon after he was captured 22 years ago.

http://www.debka.com/headline_print.php?hid=5392

Try reading your chosen title again.  Does it actually reflect the perspective of a terrorist?  Nah, it was your opinion.

Absolutely, on a roll, but I don't claim to be a "realityman" who seems to have some serious difficulty with reality.  Be my guest and do a little research on your own.  Just check out those who are those quoted by Klein and how he might have accomplished obtaining the quotes if you find his op ed so truthful and responsible.  And while you're at it see if you can locate a bit of information related to the The Washington Institute for Near East Policy? Who funds and supports this organization?   There's plenty of info out there and not just on Source Watch nor Wikipedia.

Your problem non-reality man is you post propaganda, call it truth and/or valid news and it is intolerable to you and those of like beliefs to have anyone, even here in an anonymous on-line forum, question the veracity or validity of your claims.

Expose myself?  To what to a Zionist propagandist? Expose myself because my opinion is in conflict with yours? Or that I should have the
audacity to question one more piece of what in my opinion, another piece of excrement from the infamous Farah and his so-called "correspondent" on the equally infamous WND. 

Cass, Realityman started the post to bring up the topic of ceasefires and how they help Hamas and hurt Israel.  Nothing he stated can be called propaganda - it was indeed an opinion (and one I happen to agree with).  He linked his source and so far no contradictory evidence has been presented.

Perhaps, try looking at the question like this:  Do ceasefires help Hamas more than Israel?

I think they do, and it seams that realityman holds the same opinion.  If you disagree, then you believe either 1)  Ceasefires help Israel more than Hamas, or 2) Ceasefires don't help either side more than the other. 

There has yet to be any evidence offered that contradicts realityman's assertion.  The worst way to debate this topic is to attack the sources.  Some sources are indeed slanted and others are quite objective.  If there are factual errors in the article, please point them out. 

Your first post linked to an article which drove the point home that Hamas was upset that other militant groups were breaking the cease-fire.


This doesn't call into question Realityman's points.  To the contrary, this quote seems to reinforce the point of this thread.  Hamas is getting upset because the cease-fire is still in its infancy.  Hamas has not had enough time to rearm, resupply, and regroup and as a result, they are taking the unusual step of "lashing out" at rival militants when it comes to attacking Israel.

Furthermore, the "editor's comment" that you also posted seems to side with what Realityman was arguing:


Perhaps the aforementioned group of people recognize that the ceasefire hurts Israel and gives militant groups a change to resupply.  Again, the premise of this thread is that these ceasefires serve only one group tactically, and that is Hamas.  The Israelis reluctantly agree to the ceasefire because to refuse would invite scorn and resentment from the International Community.  Olmert, Blair, Bush, Rice, McCain, and Obama may actually understand this and know that without a ceasefire, Hamas is weakened.  Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised that they breathe a collective sigh or relief when Hamas is squeezed ever tighter.

Well things are a little more clear......I commented on the other post you are blinded by either hatred for Jews, pacifism in the face of extremism, or ignorance of history.....with your latest gem here....I can remove pacifism.

It's apparent now it is hatred of Jews and ignorance of history.

If your "A week in Gaza" link was to show horrors "no different than the Holocaust" then maybe you don't understand what the Nazis actually did.

Spend some time On this site then come back with that crap.

What you show is an impoverished nation.....maybe the rich Arab brethren should intervene before Israel, eh?

Clearly on this issue, those who have commented to date share an opinion and continue with the standard operating factors included in an op ed that re-enforce their opinions. While demanding proof related to what is only opinion all fail to answer the simple question as to whether there should be a variety of opinions examined for anyone who has not already developed a preconceived one to gain an additional perspective on the issue.  Avoiding the standard claim of anti-semitism against anyone who may assert a different view of the questionable behavior of the government of Israel and the official actions taken by that government in concert with the Bush Administration, the choice has been to label me instead as a "Jew hater." Hardly, the correct term for one who is the grandmother of two Jewish young people, but feel free to continue such personal attacks because I choose to disagree with the continued actions of the government of a nation, though hardly it's people.

As to the historical factors, I'm most likely the only person commenting here who was actually able to relate to the birth of the nation of Israel, now 60 years ago, though as a young person, the same age as my youngest Jewish granddaughter who only this past October celebrated her Bat Mitzvah. In addition, I remember well the last actual war fought by Israel against her neighbors in the attack by Egypt in the Yom Kippur War of 1973 because my spouse was a U.S. military participant in Operation Nickelgrass, stated by Meir at the time as the "airlift that saved Israel."  Though attacks have occurred on a few occasions since that time, they can hardly be labeled as "wars" other than
the invasion and occupation of Lebanon by Israel.

There is no question that Klein's opinion is quite the same as those who posted it and agreed with it. It was the same preconceived one that denies any negotiation with those
who are defined as terrorists, though the "terrorists" were legitimately elected, by the people they now represent.  The preconceived attitudes and belligerence, combined with
the continued actions of the Israeli government are at the base of the inability on any realistic level to provide any present or future negotiations because both Israel and the current U.S. Administration are as intransigent as Klein and those who agree with his opinion. 

Fear rules rather than rationality so the intransigence continues.  IMHO opinion, it is time for Israel  to act out of confidence rather than fear which means a change from acting by preemptive attacks and instead participate along with other nations, including the peoples who remain in territories provided to them in the partition,in negotiations. 

Is such  an assertion a possibility? I have no idea, but 60 years of conflict with the possibility or quite likely a probability of more warfare appears to be the only solution expounded by those who support the continuation of the singular choice of only a military option.  After 60 years it's time for the nation of Israel to finally put aside the fear and follow the words I also remember that might finally end the constant conflict, "Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate." John F. Kennedy.

To that end are those who continue as Klein did with the preconceived attitudes related to the current cease fire agreement tolerant enough to even consider other opinions?

If so then perhaps they might entertain this one put forward recently by Robert Weitzel. These two paragraphs are telling as they relate to this thread and the possibility of
the inclusion of contrasting opinions. 

"Past victimhood is no moral justification for Israel’s repressive, draconian “defensive” policies against Palestinian resistance, whether that resistance takes the form of slingshots or backpack explosives. Nothing excuses the killing of innocents on either side, but we do well to remember that terror bombing was midwife to the birth of the state of Israel. Indeed, Israeli historian Benny Morris speculates,“The Arabs may well have learned the value of terrorist bombings from the Jews.”

Former Israeli Prime Minister Yizhak Shamir argued that “neither Jewish ethics nor tradition can disqualify terrorism as a means of combat.” Defending his terrorist past to an interviewer in1998 he further claimed,“Had I not acted as I did, it is doubtful that we would have been able to create an independent Jewish state of our own.”  No doubt Palestinian fighters are thinking the same regarding an independent Palestinian state of their own.

Since there is no overwhelming strategic or moral reason for the United States to continue its “non-negotiable” support of Israel, that country should be treated like any other ally and not like an over-indulged adolescent. It is time Israel makes its own way in the world. To assume it is incapable of doing so is anti-Semitism worthy of the brush stroke, and a MAD policy we can no longer afford."

The full article by Weitzel published on June 23rd on "Counterpunch" is located on the link, for those who might choose to entertain opinions other than preconceived ones.

http://www.counterpunch.org/weitzel06232008.html

Realityman,

   There is enough blame to go around with all parties concerned. Right now we are in the second day of a very tenuous 'cease fire'. That is more than there ever was before...baby steps before bigger changes don't you think?